Closure
Malark-O-Meter was a prototype for a much larger project I have in mind, called Sound Check. I've stopped updating Malark-O-Meter, but maintain it and its domain name.
Inspiration
We weigh a lot of factors when we decide what politicians will get our vote or campaign donations. One important factor is factuality, or grounding in facts. Not everyone has the time or training necessary to check whether the facts back up what a politician says. Yet everyone would make better decisions if they knew both the facts and how well politicians knew the facts. Recently, fact checking websites have risen to the challenge, providing an invaluable public service by discussing and scoring the veracity of politicians' claims. These websites continue a long tradition that began back when newspapers were printed on paper, which would then be wrapped around an order of fish and chips.
Some fact checking websites assemble their ratings into "report cards" on individuals and groups. Often, however, these report cards don't give us a simple, intuitive measure of factuality that summarizes the statements an individual has made and is easy to compare across individuals and time. More importantly, fact checking report cards give us only a small and possibly biased sample of statement ratings for each individual. Sometimes, we want to judge a politicians' factuality during a certain event, like a debate, which shrinks the sample even smaller.
Taking measurements based on a sample moves us out of the simple, orderly world of descriptive statistics and into the weird world of inferential statistics. Not only do we need to measure the factuality of individuals and groups. Not only do we need to compare them to one another. Not only do we need to measure the existence and extent of bias of fact checkers. We need to estimate the level of certainty with which we can much such comparisons and claims.
Malark-O-Meter is more than a set of statistical methods and analyses. It's more than a forum for discussion about the science of veracity measurement. It's all of those things plus another weapon in our civic arsenal that will help us make more informed decisions.
Factuality isn't the only important salient characteristic of a politician. Fact checkers' report cards aren't the only way to measure veracity. Not all fact checkers are made equal. And it is most important to know the facts rather than simply know how well politicians know them. But Malark-O-Meter provides a nuanced, evidence-based window through which we can glimpse the complex landscape of verity.
Some fact checking websites assemble their ratings into "report cards" on individuals and groups. Often, however, these report cards don't give us a simple, intuitive measure of factuality that summarizes the statements an individual has made and is easy to compare across individuals and time. More importantly, fact checking report cards give us only a small and possibly biased sample of statement ratings for each individual. Sometimes, we want to judge a politicians' factuality during a certain event, like a debate, which shrinks the sample even smaller.
Taking measurements based on a sample moves us out of the simple, orderly world of descriptive statistics and into the weird world of inferential statistics. Not only do we need to measure the factuality of individuals and groups. Not only do we need to compare them to one another. Not only do we need to measure the existence and extent of bias of fact checkers. We need to estimate the level of certainty with which we can much such comparisons and claims.
Malark-O-Meter is more than a set of statistical methods and analyses. It's more than a forum for discussion about the science of veracity measurement. It's all of those things plus another weapon in our civic arsenal that will help us make more informed decisions.
Factuality isn't the only important salient characteristic of a politician. Fact checkers' report cards aren't the only way to measure veracity. Not all fact checkers are made equal. And it is most important to know the facts rather than simply know how well politicians know them. But Malark-O-Meter provides a nuanced, evidence-based window through which we can glimpse the complex landscape of verity.
Origins
Malark-O-Meter began during the 2012 presidential election as a series of blog posts at one of Brash Equilibrium's other websites, My n of 3, where he was also posting a serial memoir of his Fulbright Scholarship to the Commonwealth of Dominica. For a couple of days while in Dominica, the weather was terrible and Brash couldn't do any fieldwork. So he stayed inside for 48 hours, did some coding in R, and then made this website, admittedly with the help of Weebly.
The rest is history, and the future.
The rest is history, and the future.
About Brash Equilibrium
Brash is an evolutionary anthropologist who studies generosity, social inequality, aggression, warfare, and cooperation. His research has been funded by the National Science Foundation, the National Institute for Child Health and Human Development, and the Institute for International Education. He learned statistics in the halls of University of Washington's Biostatistics Department, during self study as a National Science Foundation Integrated Graduate Education and Research Trainee (IGERT) in IGERT Program in Evolutionary Modeling , and as a trainee in formal demography at the Center for Studies in Demography and Ecology. He was also a Fulbrighter to the Eastern Caribbean, where he learned to play a mean game of dominoes and studied how household pecking orders influenced the amount of money and other goods those household members received from migrants. Brash's real name is Ben Hanowell. His daughter calls him Papa. People in Dominica call him Benji. He blogs about science and writes a serial memoir at www.mynof3.com, writes for Guru science lifestyle magazine, and tweets impulsively @BrashEQLibrium. Once upon a time, he wrote fart jokes at thisorthat.com. He is also the Grand Master Crux Europa of the Self-Important, Arrogant, Masculine Men Who Cross Their Legs Euro-Style.
Surprisingly, given the name of this website, he's not Irish.
Surprisingly, given the name of this website, he's not Irish.
Why is the color scheme so freaking dark?
Because I often work on this in the middle of the night with lights off.